October 1999
Mulder pulled his door open, grinning at Scully.
"Hello," she said, her eyebrows knitting together, looking him up and down.
"Hi."
"What's got you in such a good mood?"
"Life," he said with a shrug, stepping aside to let her enter, although she remained in the hallway.
"Life?" she asked and he nodded, his smile growing.
"Yes. Tonight I am happy to be living this life."
"Okay," she said with a slight nod.
"You gonna come in? Or just keep standing there?"
"Is there a gas leak in your apartment?" she asked and he laughed, shaking his head.
"Not that I'm aware of," he said, beckoning her to come inside.
"I'll trust you," she said, stepping across the threshold and then stopping in her tracks, pointing at the table. "What's that?"
"Oh, Scully," he said, nudging her to keep moving so he could shut the door. "You're an intelligent person. Surely you recognize a pumpkin when you see one."
"Or two?" she asked, looking at him.
"Yes. There are two pumpkins. There are two of us, hence I got two."
"For what reason?"
"Scully, Scully, Scully," he said, shaking his head and reaching out to take her coat. "It's October. What do we do with pumpkins in October?"
"We, Mulder?" she asked, shrugging off her coat and crossing her arms. "We have never done anything with pumpkins."
"Exactly," he said, hanging her coat on his coat rack. "We never have and so it needed to be rectified."
"So you bought pumpkins for us to carve?" she asked, looking at him with a half smile.
"Yup!" he said, clapping and then rubbing his hands together. "I have a stack of newspapers I've been meaning to toss out that we can lay out on the table, spoons for scooping, and sharp knives for carving. We're goin' full board nostalgic here."
"Is that why you invited me over? Did you have this specific activity in mind?" she asked, stepping closer to the table and touching each of the pumpkins. "Because I remember you saying something about dinner and yet all I see are these pumpkins."
"Dinner is on the way. I ordered some Chinese food just a few minutes ago when I got home from the store. It should be here soon."
"It's been a long time since I've carved a pumpkin," she mused, glancing at him.
"For me too. It should be fun." He grinned as she looked back at the pumpkins.
"I want this one," she said, touching the rounder of the two.
"Whatever you want," he said, nodding at her.
"But I want to eat first. No getting sidetracked."
"Of course not. I would never expect you to do anything on an empty stomach," he said and she snorted, turning her head to look at him.
"You're so full of shit," she said.
"Sheesh. Such language."
She rolled her eyes and he smiled, watching as she patted her pumpkin. A knock sounded at the door and he turned around to answer it.
The pumpkins were moved aside as they ate, and he watched how often her eyes fell on them, most likely imagining how it would look carved.
When the food had been put away, he covered the table in newspaper while she went to use the bathroom. Two large bowls, different sized spoons, and knives were laid beside the pumpkins along with a couple of kitchen towels.
"Okay. Let's do this," she said, walking back into the room.
He looked up and froze for a moment, taking in the sight of her. She had changed out of her black sweater and was now wearing one of his gray t-shirts.
"Well, go ahead and help yourself," he said, hoping to cover how the sight of her in his clothes made him feel.
"Thanks. I did," she said, looking down at his shirt. "Seeing as how I wasn't informed about the evening's activities, I needed something different to wear than my sweater. It was expensive and I didn't want to get pumpkin guts on it. So… I borrowed a shirt. That's okay, right?" She raised her eyes to his and he had to push aside his myriad of thoughts, keeping his face neutral.
"Ye… yeah… it's fine. Not a problem."
"Good," she said, smiling as she stepped past him and stood in front of her pumpkin. He cleared his throat and then picked up a knife, handing it to her.
"Ready?"
"I'm always ready to slice and dice," she said and he laughed with a nod.
They cut the tops off the pumpkins and began to scoop out the insides.
"Ugh," he said, separating the seeds and dropping them into a bowl. "I forgot how this feels."
"It's not as bad as intestines," she said, doing the same as she shrugged.
"Come on," he said, shaking his head and making a face.
"You started it," she said, smiling at him as she picked up her spoon, continuing to scoop out her pumpkin.
When the insides were clean, they sat down to begin carving. He watched her, the concentrated expression on her face causing him to smile.
Large pieces of pumpkin lay on the table when she set down her knife and looked up at him.
"You done?"
"Yeah," he said.
"You think yours is better than mine?"
He glanced at the triangle eyes, the round nose, and large gaping mouth he had cut into his pumpkin, knowing it was quite simplistic.
"No. Not a chance."
"Good. Because mine's really good."
"Let's see it then. Prove it," he said, smiling and raising his eyebrows. She smiled back, turning her pumpkin around, and he laughed.
She had made triangle eyes as well, but had added eyelashes and eyebrows, one of them raised higher than the other. The nose was also triangle and the mouth was shaped into a happy, wide smile.
"That's really good. I like the eyelashes."
"Hmm," she hummed, looking at the pumpkin. "I thought you'd say the eyebrow." She looked at him, raising hers to match the expression she had carved and he laughed.
"Yeah. I like them both."
"Let me see yours."
He turned his pumpkin around and she shook her head as she smiled.
"You went traditional. Nostalgic, just like you wanted. I like it."
"Thanks. I'm pretty proud of him. His name's Greg, by the way."
"Greg. Nice," she said, laughing through her nose. "I didn't name mine."
"Hmm," he hummed, sitting back with a deep breath and staring at her pumpkin. "I think she looks like a LuEllen."
"LuEllen?" she asked with a laugh.
"Hell yeah. But LuLu for short. She's definitely a LuLu."
"Okay. LuLu it is then." He nodded, holding her gaze as he smiled. She looked back down at his pumpkin and then at the mess on the table. "Should we clean up this mess and then cook the seeds?"
"Yeah. That sounds good. Although I don't know how to do that."
"Well," she said, standing up and beginning to clear up the mess. "It's lucky you invited me over since I do know how."
"Don't look, Greg. Or you LuLu," he said, standing up and turning them to face the wall. "We're about to cook up your insides."
"Jesus, Mulder," she said, shaking her head as she laughed.
Sitting on the couch a couple of hours later, their feet up on the coffee table, they munched on the seeds from the bowl that sat between them. The only light in the room came from the pumpkins, lit by the two emergency candles he had found in the back of a kitchen drawer, and set on the two round tables across from them.
"Greg gives off a lot of light," she said.
"He can't really avoid it, with a mouth that large," he said, grabbing a handful of seeds and putting them in his mouth. She snorted out a laugh and he smiled as he chewed, watching as she brushed absentmindedly at his shirt that she still wore, which continued to give him an internal thrill.
"I was thinking as I was carving the pumpkin-"
"LuEllen," he said and she exhaled a laugh.
"LuEllen," she agreed with a nod. "Anyway, I was thinking about a story my aunt used to tell us."
"Would this, by chance, be your Irish Aunt Olive?"
"It would," she said with a smile.
"Well, this should be good then."
"Why?"
"Ireland? The old country? Nostalgia, Scully. The theme of our evening. Come on now," he said, picking up a few more seeds.
"Anyway," she said again. "She used to tell us about how they carved faces into turnips and potatoes in Ireland."
"Turnips? Oh, I'd cut myself for sure if I was carving into a turnip. That's a given. Wait… is a turnip smaller than a potato?"
"Depends on the potato, I suppose," she said, shrugging her shoulders. "A potato is softer, of course, but I feel the turnip would be better, as it would last longer once it was cut into. Especially if the reason for the carvings was to keep Stingy Jack away from your home."
"Stingy Jack?"
"You've never heard about Stingy Jack?" she asked, looking at him incredulously.
"Don't think so," he said, shaking his head. "Tell me about him."
"Well, what I remember is that he was an old, stingy, curmudgeon of a man-"
"Hence his name," he said.
"Are you gonna keep interrupting or do you want to hear the story?"
"Sorry. Please, go ahead," he said, putting a few more seeds in his mouth and then crossing his arms.
"Thank you," she said, shaking her head. "So he was a stingy and rude man who one day helped an old man, who was actually an angel in disguise."
"Hmm," he hummed and she looked at him with narrowed eyes. "What? I didn't say anything!"
"Hmm," she hummed in a mocking tone and he mimed locking his lips, chewing silently on the pumpkin seeds. "So, as I was saying, the angel revealed themself to Jack and granted him three wishes for his kindness. But, seeing as how he was truly a stingy and unkind person, he used the wishes to bring punishment to others and as a result, the angel didn't let him enter Heaven."
He looked at her and put his fingers to his lips, beginning to unzip them, when she put a hand up.
"I'm not done yet, just hold on."
He nodded, re-zipping his lips and she smiled.
"He wasn't allowed into Heaven, but nor was he allowed into Hell because when Satan had heard of all he had done and he attempted to drag him to Hell as punishment, Jack deflected and tricked him, making him look foolish. So Satan basically told him to get fucked and he was condemned to roam the world between the two planes with only a hollowed out turnip, that contained a small ember of light, to guide his path," she said and he smiled. "People then carved turnips to ward off the evil spirits, like Stingy Jack, that may be roaming around us, though we cannot see them." She looked at him and nodded. "You may speak now."
He mimed unzipping his lips slowly, and then tossing the key away, as she rolled her eyes with a smile.
"You believe that, but you don't believe in ghosts?" he asked and she shook her head.
"No, I don't believe in ghosts. But, I'm not saying I believe that story either. It's just something I was told as a child."
"I see," he said, nodding slowly and she bumped his shoulder with her own.
"It's only a story."
"I don't know," he said, looking at his pumpkin. "I think Greg could ward them off. Any spirits really, but especially Stingy Jack."
"With that smile, the spirits would definitely wonder what's going on in his head," she said and he laughed quietly.
"LuEllen could do it as well, though in a different way."
"How do you mean?"
"She'd play it cool… bat her eyelashes, draw them in sweetly, and then she'd strike with precision and no remorse."
"I could see that," she agreed, nodding as she put another pumpkin seed in her mouth and he smiled. The flame of the candle sparked brighter for just a second and she bumped his shoulder again. "Oh, did you see that?!"
"I did," he said, staring at the pumpkin, almost willing it to happen again, even though he knew it was most likely only a small draft.
"Good thing you thought about getting the pumpkins tonight, huh?" she asked in a teasing tone.
"Yeah," he said with a nod, wondering if it was only a draft. "Although, I didn't expect there to be spirits here…"
"Mulder," she laughed, shaking her head.
"What?"
"You just never fail to surprise me." She smiled as he turned his head to look at her.
"That's good, right?" he asked, slightly teasing, but also serious.
"Yeah. It is," she said, chewing on another seed as she nodded, continuing to smile.
The candlelight crackled and then flickered again, causing them to both look over at the pumpkins.
"Got another one," she said and he smiled.
"Or it was just a draft," he said quietly.
"Nah. Not tonight," she whispered, shaking her head, and his smile grew.
"Not tonight," he agreed.
He felt her lean against him, sighing softly as they continued to watch the dancing candlelight in the pumpkins, keeping the evil spirits away.
Because tonight, it was definitely not a draft.